UPDATED: Hovertravel’s Ryde to Southsea service is to remain suspended into Monday morning due to a technical issue with Island Flyer – the only hovercraft left operating on the busy route.
The troubled hovercraft was pulled at around 12:30 today due to a technical issue with an onboard pump, resulting in a complete suspension of the service.
Hovertravel advised that the repair would take 2 hours to complete, but at 16:00 the problem had still not been resolved. There was then 4 hours of no communication from the company before the devastating news was delivered to commuters and day trippers via email at 21:00.
Island Flyer is the only hovercraft operating for Hovertravel at the moment as her sister craft, Solent Flyer, has been taken to Southampton for 7 weeks’ repair.
It has been announced tonight that the service will remain suspended with an update to be issued at 09:00 tomorrow morning.
Staff will be situated at Ryde Pier and Portsmouth Harbour train station, as well as in the terminals, to assist passengers during the busy commuter period and throughout the morning.
Hovertravel apologise for the disruption to your journeys tomorrow morning and say that customers should be reassured that engineers are working on the issue overnight and throughout the morning. But that will not be much comfort to those who now face disruption to their day.
UPDATE MONDAY @ 09:00 – Hovertravel’s service is to remain suspended for the rest of the morning and into this afternoon.
An update is expected from the company at 13:00.
Island Flyer has now been started in over 18 hours, indicating that there is still a fair amount of work to be done x including sea trials – before she re-enters service.
UPDATE @ 12:55 – There is bad news for those looking to cross the Solent today as Hovertravel have confirmed that the service is to remain suspended for the rest of the afternoon.
The next update will be made available at 17:00.
Commuters have taken to Facebook to comment on the lack of communication from Hovertravel about the ongoing technical issue. Island Flyer has not been started in over 22 hours, despite the operator initially saying the repair work would take just 2 hours.
UPDATE @ 16:39 – Hovertravel have announced that the service remains suspended this afternoon. The next update will be at 19:00 this evening.
